


I Like The Way You Make It

by vulcanhighblood



Category: Naruto
Genre: Discord: Umino Hours, Found Family, Gen, Parent Umino Iruka, Umino Hours Winter Bingo, Umino Iruka Needs a Hug, Umino Iruka is a Bad Cook, Uzumaki Naruto is a Good Kid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-18 12:23:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28992129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vulcanhighblood/pseuds/vulcanhighblood
Summary: Iruka tries to make Naruto some hot chocolate, with mixed success.
Relationships: Umino Iruka & Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 5
Kudos: 43
Collections: The Umino Hours Winter Bingo 2020





	I Like The Way You Make It

**Author's Note:**

> My sixth work in the Umino Hours Discord Server's Winter Bingo.  
> Written for the prompt: Hot Chocolate

“Eww, what’s that smell?” Naruto demanded, wandering into the kitchen and flopping bonelessly into a chair, squinting blearily at Iruka. 

He’d gotten home from a D-rank mission with Team 7 and had immediately dived into his futon in Iruka’s spare room for a nap. He’d woken for dinner but had gone right back to sleep after that. After a bit of grading, Iruka had just started attempting to make a snack for himself and Naruto. Unfortunately, Iruka was attempting to prepare a new recipe, and his efforts had turned disastrous enough to wake the growing boy.

Iruka made a face at the boy before explaining, “I was making hot chocolate.”

Naruto lifted an eyebrow. “Hot chocolate? Don’t you usually just use the powder mix and hot water to make that? How did you make such a mess?” he gestured at the kitchen counter which was, well, pretty well scattered with random kitchen utensils, bowls, and ingredients.

“Well yes, but,” Iruka sighed, turning off the stove and staring forlornly down at a lump of what had to be scalded - possibly burned - chocolate at the bottom of his pot. He hoped that wouldn’t be hard to scrape out, but knowing his track record… “I got this recipe from-”

“Are you trying to cook another one of Kakashi-sensei’s recipes?” Naruto demanded, now sounding disappointed  _ and _ sleepy. “I told you you don’t need to do that.”

_ Yes, but you always go on about his cooking, _ Iruka thought miserably, poking the scalded chocolate with his spatula. It was hard as a rock. It was almost impressive how quickly he’d managed to turn perfectly good chocolate into an inedible lump. He’d just wanted to… well, he wasn’t entirely sure what he’d been planning. But Naruto had gone on and on about how good Kakashi’s hot chocolate had tasted, and so Iruka had asked the boy’s Jonin-sensei for a recipe in order to recreate it at home. Kakashi had been kind enough to offer to make it for both of them, but that wasn’t the  _ point! _ The point was that Iruka was… well. Okay, fine, he admitted it. He was jealous of Kakashi, and how much Naruto would go on and on about him. Which was good! Iruka was glad Naruto had a teacher who saw him as more than just a troublemaker or a demon fox, but as time wore on he found himself more and more frantic to prove to Naruto that  _ he was good at things too! _ Except it turned out that a lot of the things Kakashi was good at were things Iruka was definitely  _ not _ good at. So that tended to complicate matters a bit. 

Naruto was watching Iruka closely, a bit of a frown creasing his otherwise sleepy expression. “Iruka-sensei,” he said slowly, “I like the powder mix, too.”

Forcing a laugh that didn’t quite feel genuine, Iruka tossed his ruined pot in the sink before filling the kettle and setting it on the stove to boil. “Me too,” he said. “Let’s have the instant cocoa instead.” He stiffly sat down at the kitchen table, fiddling with the homework he’d been grading until he had managed to settle himself. Glancing over at Naruto, he felt a  _ real _ smile tugging at his lips as he aske, “So, how was today’s mission?”

Naruto beamed back at him. “It was great! We had to find a lost cat, and Kakashi-sensei told us how to track a cat,  _ but he said he didn’t want to do it,” _ he added in an undertone. “I think he was just being lazy, really. He said it was because we had to learn tracking skills for ourselves, and he’d told us  _ how, _ so now it was up to us to try it out.”

It was a solid teaching method, Iruka really couldn’t fault him, even if Naruto was of the opinion that knowing how to do something meant  _ you _ should be the one to do it. “If Kakashi-sensei always did the work for you, how would you learn to do it for yourself?”

“Aw, not you too, Iruka-sensei!” Naruto moaned. “It was  _ exhausting! _ It’s so hard to find the right cat! Did you know there were  _ thousands _ of cats around here?”

Iruka felt that the boy was probably exaggerating that number, but he cooed sympathetically anyway. On the stove, the water began to boil. Iruka popped up from the table, spooning several scoops of hot cocoa mix into two mugs before pouring boiling water over them and stirring them briskly. He carried the two mugs over, handing one to Naruto. “Careful, it’s-”

“Hot!” Naruto screeched, having attempted to drink despite  _ watching _ Iruka pour boiling water into the cups. He sucked a deep breath in, and huffed a few times, drawing the air in and out over his burned tongue. “I hing I eed ah-er,” he said, blue eyes pleading with Iruka.

Clucking his tongue, Iruka rose and filled a glass with cold water. “Next time wait a minute before you try to drink  _ boiled water, _ okay?”

“Ohay,” Naruto agreed, taking a sip and swishing the cold water around his mouth for several seconds. He finished the rest of the glass before eyeing his mug of hot cocoa.

Sighing, Iruka reached over and confiscated the mug. “Not yet,” he said.

Naruto’s shoulders slumped. “Fine,” he grumbled, laying his head down on the table and watchign Iruka work for a minute. “Hey Iruka-sensei?” he said, head still pressed to the table.

“Yes?” Iruka set down his pen and gave the boy his full attention. 

“Why do you keep trying to cook?”

Iruka blinked in surprise. “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Naruto lifted his head, indicating the messy kitchen with a sweeping gesture. “Why do you keep trying to cook all this fancy stuff?”

Iruka swallowed hard, his gaze dropping to the homework assignments sitting on the table in front of him. “I guess I thought it would be fun?” he said.

Naruto gave him a look that clearly stated he not only doubted this statement but had absolutely no idea why Iruka would expect him to believe it. “But you hate cooking,” he said.

“I don’t  _ hate  _ cooking,” Iruka protested, though it was a pretty weak argument considering how often he used to eat instant noodles, pre-prepared foods, or used frozen mixes and instant sauces that required about three steps to cook. He’d never really been one to cook from scratch because it was so exhausting and then you ate it and all that hard work was  _ gone. _ “I’m just not… good at it.” 

Naruto was looking at Iruka like he wasn’t sure whether to laugh or shout. “Do you have to be good at it?”

“I…” Iruka felt his face heating under Naruto’s intense scrutiny. He shoved the mug of hot chocolate back in the boy’s direction. “Here, that should be cool enough to drink now.”

Naruto accepted the mug, carefully taking a sip before setting it back down. “You don’t have to be a good cook, you know.” He smiled then, that sweet sunny smile that always made Iruka’s heart swoop in his chest and want to protect him from the world and every terrible thing he would invariably face in his life. “You just have to be Iruka-sensei.”

“I know that,” Iruka said wearily, gazing down into his own mug of powdered hot chocolate that couldn’t hold a candle to Kakashi’s homemade drinking chocolate. “I just want to be… better.”

Naruto tapped the table, causing Iruka to lift his gaze. He was scowling at Iruka. “You’re already the best,” Naruto declared, “how do you get better than that?”

“The best?” Iruka repeated blankly.

“The best!” Naruto insisted. “Why do you think I come here all the time instead of staying in my apartment? I don’t come for the  _ food,” _ he added, giving Iruka a sharp look. “I come for  _ you. _ Because you’re always here to let me in and you give me hot chocolate, and dinner, and let me sleep in a nice bed with sheets you bought just for me, and… and you  _ want _ me to be here,” he added in a small voice. “And that’s nice. Really nice.” He set his mug down, hard, tilting his chin stubbornly, his bright blue eyes narrowed as he declared, “So you don’t have to be a good cook, okay! You’re already the best there is, Iruka-sensei.”

“I see,” Iruka said, swallowing hard to fight back the tears in his voice. “Thank you for letting me know.”

“Besides,” Naruto continued, returning to his hot chocolate, “you’re really bad at it and burned food makes the apartment smell bad.”

Despite himself, Iruka barked a sharp laugh at that, and Naruto lifted his eyes to look at him, wearing a mischievous grin. 

“All right,” Iruka said, taking another sip of his own hot chocolate, noting that the powdered cocoa didn’t taste as terrible as it had earlier. “I guess I’ll keep making the usual hot chocolate, then.”

“Good,” Naruto said firmly, taking another sip from his own mug before setting it down and grinning at Iruka. “Besides, I like the way you make it.”

Smiling back, Iruka took a contented sip of his own hot chocolate and sighed. Iruka may not be a good cook, but if Naruto liked the way he made hot chocolate, that was good enough for him. 

**Author's Note:**

> Written in sprints at the Umino Hours discord server! Thanks to everyone for the company while I try to power through enough fics to manage a bingo! This one is, alas, not really in line with any of the other bingo spaces i've covered so far  
> whoops


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